Chinese Minister Speaks Out Against South-North Water Diversion Project

China’s poker-faced party cadres are not known for speaking publicly against the country’s great engineering feats. Yet a Chinese minister has publicly called for an end to the South-North Water Diversion project, a $62billion investment designed to channel water from southern China to the arid north through three canal systems. “China tries to solve its water shortage problem by diverting water. But such a way is, to some extent, now mired in difficulties,” writes Qiu Baoxing, vice minister of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

The ambitious diversion project will be rendered irrelevant if one in three buildings in Beijing could recycle more wastewater and collect more rainwater, Qiu writes in an article published in the February issue of Water&Wastewater Engineering. The project, which officially started in 2002, is considered controversial because of its high cost, environmental impact and massive displacement of local population.

“ Recycled water could replace diverted water. Most Chinese cities are capable of finding more water if we develop water desalination technology and collect more rain water,” he writes.

Qiu says that new pollution problems have also emerged along some parts of the project’s routes. He says diverted water has led to the leaking of residues in local pipelines, a problem that is “very difficult” to solve.

Already China is grappling to deal with pollution in the central route, which is expected to start delivering water to Beijing and nearby Tianjin some time this year. The Danjiangkou Reservoir, located in central China’s Hubei Province, is badly polluted as the five rivers flowing into it are used as dumping grounds for untreated sewage, China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection acknowledged in November.

Qiu warns that new problems will emerge if China sticks to the diversion project. China has faced a number of water crises during the past few years. In March 2013, more than 16,000 diseased pig carcasses were found in Shanghai’s Huangpu River, which supplies drinking water to parts of the city.

“If we miss the opportunity to repair water ecology, we will pay dearly,” he writes. “If we try to solve our water crisis by diverting water, then new ecological problems will emerge. This is not sustainable at all.”

I am a Beijing-based writer covering China's technology sector. I contribute to Forbes, and previously I freelanced for SCMP and Nikkei. Prior to Beijing, I spent six months as an intern at TIME magazine's Hong Kong office. I am a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism...